Quote Discussion, Current quote: “Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.”

In this thread, I will present a quote. The goal is to encourage discussion on the different interpretations and meanings of the quote. Every few days, I will present a new quote for discussion. This will be an ongoing thread with a changing focus.

Current quote:

“Success consists of going from failure to failure without loss of enthusiasm.”

~Winston Churchill

Previous quotes:

“He who desires but acts not, breeds pestilence.”

-William Blake

“Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious.”

-Oscar Wilde

“Hell does not exist to punish sinners. Hell exists to ensure that no one sins.”

-Jun’ya “ZUN” Ota

“Most people are other people. Their thoughts are someone else’s opinions, their lives a mimicry, their passions a quotation.”

-Oscar Wilde

“The only thing that interferes with my learning is my education.”

-Albert Einstein

“The test of success is not what you do when you are on top. Success is how high you bounce when you hit bottom.”

-George Patton

“I like your Christ, I do not like your Christians. Your Christians are so unlike your Christ.”

-Mahatma Gandhi

“We hang the petty thieves and appoint the great ones to public office.”

“I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love.”

-Mother Teresa

“To win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill.”

-Sun Tzu

“A successful man is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks others have thrown at him.”

-David Brinkley

“It is better to live one day as a lion than 100 years as a sheep.”

-Benito Mussolini

“A coward dies a thousand deaths, a brave man dies but once.”

-William Shakespeare

“Hatred is gained as much by good works as by evil.”

-Niccolo Machiavelli

“A throne is only a bench covered with velvet.”

-Napoleon Bonaparte

“I am not afraid of an army of lions led by a sheep; I am afraid of an army of sheep led by a lion.”

-Alexander the Great

“The skilful employer of men will employ the wise man, the brave man, the covetous man, and the stupid man.”

-Sun Tzu

“Worldly wisdom teaches that it is better for reputation to fail conventionally then to succeed unconventionally.”

-John Maynard Keynes

“Victory has a thousand fathers, but defeat is an orphan.”

-John F. Kennedy

“What makes us human may one day be defined not by the gifts we possess, but by the virtues we lack.”

-Unknown

“God not only plays dice. He also sometimes throws the dice where they cannot be seen.”

-Stephen Hawking

“The most exciting attractions are between two opposites that never meet.”

-Andy Warhol

“The child is father of the man.”

-William Wordsworth

“A real man will keep all the promises the last man broke.”

-Unknown

“All murderers are punished unless they kill in large numbers and to the sound of trumpets.”

-Voltaire

“If we take the generally accepted definition of bravery as a quality which knows no fear, I have never seen a brave man. All men are frightened. The more intelligent they are, the more they are frightened.”

-George Patton

“A man who won’t die for something is not fit to live.”

-Martin Luther King Jr.

“Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.”

-Martin Luther

“Hell is other people.”

-Jean-Paul Sartre

“Man as an individual is a genius. But men in the mass form the headless monster, a great, brutish idiot that goes where prodded.”

-Charlie Chaplin

“Tolerance is the virtue of the man without convictions.”

-Gilbert K. Chesterton

“All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full.”

-King Solomon

“Time is dead as long as it is being clicked off by little wheels; only when the clock stops does time come to life.”

-William Faulkner

“Run away from greatness and greatness will follow you.”

-Abu Bakr

“I know that I am intelligent, because I know that I know nothing.”

-Socrates

“Beware that you do not lose the substance by grasping at the shadow.”

-Aesop

“A man who views the world the same at fifty as he did at twenty has wasted thirty years of his life.”

~Muhammad Ali

“Prey on the weak and you will survive, prey on the strong and you will live.”

Pestilence—something evil, unwanted, or destructive. So I would say you are close. Someone who wants something but does not act or put in place plans to obtain it, can count on having unwanted results. Although i think for the author to put pestilence in there is overdramatic. Just because one didn’t get the job they desired doesn’t make it an “evil” result :-)

The first quote didn’t get much discussion, so I’m changing the quote a little sooner than I planned.

Here is the new quote:

“Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious.”

-Oscar Wilde

I think this is a good, right to the point way of saying that a lot of so called “patriots” are harming society. Real patriots would understand diversity. Racists who hate immigrants and call themselves “patriots” are damaging our society. What do you think of this quote and what it says about “patriots”?

Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious? I guess it could be taken two ways, depending on whether you placed the “vicious” first or the “patriotism”. It could mean that a lot of patriots are misconstruing the real meaning of patriotism and are destroying things instead. It could also mean that patriotism brings out the most ferocious qualities in people—it is something they will defend to the death.

You’re wrong.
I meant, that I fully agree with the quote, that patriotism is just a way to attack “others”.
We should love HUMANS, not COUNTRIES.
Patriots willingly and happily kill PEOPLE, if they serve in the army of an “enemy” COUNTRY.
Just another reason to KILL, not LOVE…
That’s why I consider it FAKE and EVIL.
Grey can’t be used in the case of LIVES being at stake…

You’re wrong.
I meant, that I fully agree with the quote, that patriotism is just a way to attack “others”.
We should love HUMANS, not COUNTRIES.
Patriots willingly and happily kill PEOPLE, if they serve in the army of an “enemy” COUNTRY.
Just another reason to KILL, not LOVE…
That’s why I consider it FAKE and EVIL.
Grey can’t be used in the case of LIVES being at stake…

To love your own nation, and want it to grow, and be pridefull of your own nationhood, doesnt mean you have to despite all other nations and think everything outside your nation should perish. I consider myself very patriotic, but I am hardly xenophobic.

Problem is, many patriots can quite see the difference… And mankind already has the natural tendence to hate the different, so…

tenco, seriously.
Patriotism is basically “I’m better than you, so it makes me proud”.
Xenophobia is basically “You’re worse than me, so it makes me despise/hate you”.
They’re quite identical and both based on comparison.
Do YOU know the way to separate them?

tenco, seriously.
Patriotism is basically “I’m better than you, so it makes me proud”.
Xenophobia is basically “You’re worse than me, so it makes me despise/hate you”.
They’re quite identical and both based on comparison.
Do YOU know the way to separate them?

This is where you are wrong.

It is not a matter of automatically assume you are superior, just because you are from the country you are. It is a matter of knowing your country traditions, and dont be afraid of assuming then, rather then just ignoring then and copiyng other countries.

In this aspect, I can be considered quite anticonventional of a patriot, as I am actually a natural rebel. I guess that more apropriate would be to say, that I do not love the Brazil which is, but the Brazil which could be…

The first quote didn’t get much discussion, so I’m changing the quote a little sooner than I planned.

Here is the new quote:

“Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious.”

-Oscar Wilde

I think this is a good, right to the point way of saying that a lot of so called “patriots” are harming society. Real patriots would understand diversity. Racists who hate immigrants and call themselves “patriots” are damaging our society. What do you think of this quote and what it says about “patriots”?

You do know that there is a hell of a lot more to patriotism than immigration, right? And you do know there is a hell of a lot more to illegal immigration than race, right? No. You probably don’t.
And you do know that true, red-blooded patriots want nothing more than to help the society that they’re born into, right? And you do know that hundreds of thousands of true patriots have laid down their lives to defend the nation they love, right? Patriots aren’t just the boys at the borders. Patriots are soldiers. Patriots are the boys in blue. Patriots are the ardent workers of this nation. Patriots are the ones who would literally put their lives on the line to save their nation.
But no. You wouldn’t understand that would you? Bite the hand that feeds you. Bite it hard. Forget what was given to you by the “racist” patriots. Forget all about it. It doesn’t matter anymore. It just doesn’t matter.
[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/NjL2C.jpg[/IMG]

scoop
The problem that was raised here, is that most REAL-LIFE “patriots” are MUCH less concerned about “building up their country”, but rather “fighting the supposed enemies of the country”.
The people, who REALLY build their countries, more than usually DON’T put on the “patriot” nickname…
They just DO THEIRJOB…
The louder one shouts (about how “patriotic” HE is), the more probably he does nothing useful (but effectively tries to incite strifes)…

Originally posted by scoopolard:Patriots are soldiers. Patriots are the boys in blue. Patriots are the ardent workers of this nation. Patriots are the ones who would literally put their lives on the line to save their nation.

Have you served in the armed forces, scoop? Not arguing or anything, just curious.

The first quote didn’t get much discussion, so I’m changing the quote a little sooner than I planned.

Here is the new quote:

“Patriotism is the virtue of the vicious.”

-Oscar Wilde

I think this is a good, right to the point way of saying that a lot of so called “patriots” are harming society. Real patriots would understand diversity. Racists who hate immigrants and call themselves “patriots” are damaging our society. What do you think of this quote and what it says about “patriots”?

You do know that there is a hell of a lot more to patriotism than immigration, right? And you do know there is a hell of a lot more to illegal immigration than race, right? No. You probably don’t.
And you do know that true, red-blooded patriots want nothing more than to help the society that they’re born into, right? And you do know that hundreds of thousands of true patriots have laid down their lives to defend the nation they love, right? Patriots aren’t just the boys at the borders. Patriots are soldiers. Patriots are the boys in blue. Patriots are the ardent workers of this nation. Patriots are the ones who would literally put their lives on the line to save their nation.
But no. You wouldn’t understand that would you? Bite the hand that feeds you. Bite it hard. Forget what was given to you by the “racist” patriots. Forget all about it. It doesn’t matter anymore. It just doesn’t matter.
[IMG]http://i.imgur.com/NjL2C.jpg[/IMG]

I did not say that patriots are racists. I admire the true patriots like the people you are talking about. What I don’t like is people who are racist that call themselves “patriots”.

Perhaps the quote could be phrased better, but it does express something that is true. Patriotism, unless it’s tied up in ideas that one understands and is devoted to, is basically just tribalism. Patriotism can be felt by even the simplest and basest minds – and they are often the ones that most rabid about it.

Patriotism isn’t just a US thing. The inhabitants of many countries that hyper-patriotic US conservatives would consider to be unremarkable backwaters are just as patriotic as the US conservatives. I’m living in Turkey now, where even the leftists are as nationalistic and militaristic as US conservatives.

To be specific about myself as related to the US, I love the classical liberal history of Jeffersonianism. I’m not so happy about the utter negation of it in the modern welfare/warfare leviathan state. Bill Clinton said you can’t say that you love your country and hate it’s government. I will say precisely that.

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